"Thou crownest the year with Thy goodness; and Thy paths drop fatness." (Psalm 65:11)
Have you ever thought about this? The sun is hot. The sun is bright. And lest I begin to sound like some picture book bereft on any real intelligence: "The Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand." (Psalm 121:5b) A rhetorical question but, how can the Lord be both the "sun" (Psalm 84:11) and also "the shade"? I would chalk this up to one of those "thoughts are higher than our thoughts" (see Isaiah 55:9) things. One of those "one plus one equals three" things...
Wrapped in a mystery
"Vow, and pay unto the Lord your God: let all that be round about Him bring presents unto Him that ought to be feared." (Psalm 76:11)
For instance, I was walking through my neighborhood the other day and while it hadn't rained in a while, the severe cold snap that affected the area was weakening, giving way to warmer temps. As such, the ice-tipped pine needles were dropping their tiny bulbous tips. It felt like rain under the trees. As opposed to receiving shade and shelter from beneath, the sky was clear and these little cold (not unpleasant) pinpricks were falling on my head. This, too, was a seeming paradox. But again, I'm looking at it from a purely metaphorical/symbolic stance. And so my mind goes here.
What does it take for God to do something in your life? In mine? I want to know, I want to seek out His goodness but Solomon says this: "no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end." (Ecclesiastes 3:11b) You'll only tire yourself in seeking God's stuff without seeking Him. Even if you do seek Him for His stuff, He'll run circles around you even to the point of forcible humility while you learn to still your heart (or me, mine) and wait for His timing. Timing is indeed everything and even if you were to receive your petition prior to His time, you either wouldn't know what to do with it or else wouldn't know how to protect it. Check this out:
"And if we know that He hear us, (the prior verse says the one qualifier for God "hearing us"--it's "ask[ing] anything according to His will"), whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him." (1 John 5:15, emphasis mine)
Interesting, uh, tense? John couples the act of asking with the assurance of knowing we've already got what we asked for. I used to struggle with this. This is also a human "counterintuitive". Because we have a Heavenly Father who delights in seeing His children delighted. And in case you didn't know, this is the origin of the gift-giving tradition at Christmastime.
Wrapping this up
In closing, I just want to remind you that God is the most generous person. If you have anything you're inclined to give away, do so with abandon (at His leading, of course). He will abundantly supply both your wants and needs and anything else (!).
"There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth; and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." (Proverbs 11:24)